


But the Way I Feel Will Remain the Same

by niceshoteagleeye



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Sickness, dean is kind of helpless but he does his best
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-02
Updated: 2015-09-02
Packaged: 2018-04-18 15:15:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4710614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/niceshoteagleeye/pseuds/niceshoteagleeye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seth is sick. Dean isn't totally sure how to handle it but hell if he's not gonna try.</p>
            </blockquote>





	But the Way I Feel Will Remain the Same

**Author's Note:**

> The title is almost definitely kind of melodramatic for the story content, but when in doubt pick a vaguely appropriate song lyric from something you've been listening to. In this case it's The End of All Things by Panic! at the Disco.

Dean is having an uncharacteristically pleasant dream, where he's driving down an endless highway with Seth in the passenger seat, gorgeous greenery all around them. As these things tend to go for him, he's startled out of sleep by some particuarly violent coughing to his right. He looks over in alarm and sees Seth, red eyes, runny nose, hunched over, his body shaking with each cough. “Seth. Seth. What's wrong?”

“What's it look like?” Right. Stupid question. His voice sounds like he's been screaming at the top of his lungs for ten straight hours and he still manages to sound petulant. Dean would probably smirk if he wasn't so worried. He waits for Seth to stop coughing and slides his hand onto Seth's forehead. “What are you doing?”

“Checkin' for a fever.”

“Babe, do you actually know how to do that with your hand?”

Dean chews his lip. Not really, it's just what he's always seen moms and nurses do on tv. “I'll go get the thermometer. Don't die on me in here.”

Seth falls back against his pillows and kind of lazily waves his hand in response. Dean finds what he's looking for in a bathroom cabinet (knocking down several medicine bottles in the process, because that's exactly what he needs right now) and rushes back out to Seth. “Here.”

“You didn't get one of the plastic sleeves,” Seth whines, and Dean has to resist the temptation to roll his eyes.

“Well you always put 'em on before, so you can take it on its maiden bareback voyage. Open up.”

“You're such a pervert,” he grumbles, but accepts the device in his mouth.

“Only for you.” Dean marvels (not for the first time) at modern technology as the thing beeps a few seconds later, and he takes it back to check the readout. “One-oh-one point six. How bad is that?”

“Not hospital bad,” Seth groans, coughing again. “I cannot be sick. I refuse to be sick. It's physically impossible.”

Dean doesn't fight the eye roll this time. “You're not a machine. No matter what you an' your Crossfit buddies might like to think.”

“Shut up. You're supposed to be nicer to me when I feel this bad.”

He softens immediately, running his fingers through the blond patch in Seth's hair. “What can I get you?”

“There's a pack of cough drops in the kitchen. Cabinet to the left of the one just under the sink.”

Dean nods and leaves the bedroom. He's not really sure what to do. He's never going to admit it, but Seth does have some kinda freak immune system that usually keeps him from getting sick – normally he's the one taking care of Dean, who's too busy being miserable to pay any attention to what's going on. He swipes his phone from the coffee table where it got left the night before and calls Roman.

“What's got you up this early on a day off?” Roman greets him, sounding annoyingly energetic. He's an hour ahead in Florida but even so, he gets up at six every day barring some sort of catastrophe so he's already been awake for hours. Dean likes his sleep too much for that.

“Seth's sick.”

“Sick how?”

“Fever, coughing, runny nose. The standard sickness shit, I dunno.”

“Crossfit body finally failed him, huh? He must be devastated. Maybe now that the illusion is broken we can get him to exercise like a normal person.”

“Hah, yeah, that'd be the fuckin' day.” Dean finds the cabinet that Seth mentioned and tucks the phone between his shoulder and his ear so he can root around for the cough drops. “I dunno what to do, man.”

“Take care of him?”

“No shit, but how? I can barely take care of a house plant. I have no idea what I'm doin'. You have a daughter, you're probably good at this shit.”

“I'm gonna go ahead and chalk that use of 'probably' up to emotional distress and let you off the hook for that one. You take his temperature?”

“I'm not that incompetent.”

Dean thinks he hears Roman mumble something that sounds like 'coulda fooled me' before he continues speaking. “I'm gonna assume it's not life threatening since you called me instead of an ambulance. Keep him hydrated, get him some extra blankets, maybe some kinda painkillers to make him more comfortable. Make sure there's a box of tissues nearby. It ain't rocket science, man.”

“Says you.” Dean finally finds the cough drops hiding under a box of fancy nutrition bars (one of like a hundred) and stands up. “Thanks Ro.”

“Anytime. Text me on Friday and let me know when you're getting into New York.”

“Uh huh.” Dean drops his phone on the counter and grabs a bottle of Gatorade out of the fridge. He stops at the hall closet to get an extra blanket and a box of the cooling tissues that Seth saves for just these occasions (“they're sickness tissues!” Seth tells him exasperatedly every time he gets caught using them when he's healthy, but in his defense they're fucking awesome) and makes his way back to the bedroom. He drops everything onto the bed and Seth cracks open an eye at the commotion. “Uh, brought you some stuff.”

Seth gives him a soft smile that turns his insides into mush. Dean gives him a cough drop and tucks the blanket around him, setting the Gatorade and tissues on the night stand. “Thanks, Dean,” he croaks. “You probably shouldn't hang around in here, it would suck if you got sick too.”

“Baby, I sucked you off like a vacuum cleaner last night, anything that's inside of you is gonna be inside of me.”

Seth coughs out a laugh. “You're so fucking crude.”

“Yeah, well, Dr. McDreamy was too busy to come take care of you so they sent me instead.”

“McDreamy's got nothing on you.”

Dean feels himself turn bright red and says nothing, because taking compliments like that still isn't something he's too sure how to navigate. Instead he opts to climb back into bed, fitting himself around Seth in a way that doesn't put too much pressure on anything. He threads his fingers through Seth's hair, half-scratching and half-rubbing the back of his head the way he knows Seth likes, and is rewarded a second later when Seth lets out a soft moan and shuts his eyes.

“Better?” Dean asks softly, getting a weak 'mmhmm' in response. He looks at Seth and his heart feels like it's gonna come up through his throat as he takes in how fucking beautiful Seth is, even when he's got dark circles that could rival a corpse's and is snorting lightly with every breath because of congestion. He's probably never going to totally get over the amazement that Seth has chosen to spend his life with him.

Almost as if on cue, Seth opens his eyes and gives Dean a sleepy smile. “Thank you for taking care of me,” he says again. “I love you, Dean.”

“I love you too,” he responds, but Seth is already asleep again. He snuggles in closer and shuts his eyes, thinking he'll take this over an endless dream highway any day of the year.


End file.
